New Year! New Pizza Sales!

So how's business? you do ok last year? pies flying out the door right? I get emails from all over the country from Pizzeria owners with a variety of questions but the question I get the most often is "How do I market my business" I need more pizza sales!!!!

So here is a news flash WE ALL NEED MORE SALES!! want more sales and while business may be good, we want it GREAT. I have written about this in previous blogs and have tried almost every form of marketing available to boost sales, and lets face it there are a lot of guys out there that will try and sell you the tools that "they think" you need to boost sales in your town.

I am going to share a few of the marketing Ideas I have used, the success and failure's and you decide if any of them would help you.

1. Great products! are your products outstanding? do your customers refer new customers on there own? if not then its time to hit the books, websites and whatever else you need to do to make your pizza the best in town. I have won over 40 culinary awards with my pizza, sauces, crusts etc you know why? because I enter every contest I can, I participate is fund raisers and I promote myself and my pizzeria's every where I go. This is your first line of attack in the war of Marketing! promote your self, Promote your pizza, and share your products to create a buzz in the community.

2. Make sure you call your local newspaper to let them know you are in business! I know this may sound a little silly but the fact is they may not know you exist, send a pizza over to the editors office and make sure you include a menu and a HAND WRITTEN NOTE asking them if they can do a story on your business, new or not it is something the local papers DO all the time but you have to ask!

3. I have a school program that has made a huge difference in our sales and good will in the community instead of trying to explain it just go to my website and see it for yourself at www.fregenes.com/raise , now heres the kicker, I rarely donate money or pizzas to anyone that comes in and asks, why? glad you asked! let me ask you a question, the last time you donated a pizza to some organization how many sales came in from that donation? did you track them? did it help you boost your business so you could afford to donate next time someone asks? ya I thought that was what you were going to say I dun o? ok here is what I say when someone comes in to asks for a donation.
I tell them about our generous school program "and we do the same for fund raisers"! and then I tell them we would be happy to give them a printed fund raising coupon for there individual event at no cost to them, all they have to do is hand them out! and we will donate a portion of every sale to the cause.
Everyone will ask for something for free for a cause, and while we all want to help we also need to promote our business, so you are accomplishing two things here, the most important is giving back to your community! because they support you right? so its a win win, the coupons do not have to be fancy just make sure your menu is on one side with all your contact info and then make sure you specify that the fund raiser is not valid with any other promotion.

We support a lot of schools and organizations, and they support us it is a great ways to promote and give back at the same time, and here comes the shameless plug, Fregene's uses Revention POS systems and they are great, they track all our coupons easily and lets us know exactly who is buying and who is not. Contact Revention they are a great company "and no they do not pay me or give me stuff to plug them" they are just a great company to work with.

4. Direct mail works, but it is expensive, so make sure you concentrate on the 3 to 5 mile radius around your pizzeria, give your customers a good coupon, include your menu and a little about how great your products are. You also need to make sure your budget is big enough to do direct mail at least a couple of times, before you really start seeing a profit, sure you are going get a response right away and that is exciting, but make sure you are ready for it so your order flow goes well and the NEW customers are happy with the Pizza.

5. The new rage is Post It notes! and from my experience there are a few significant draw backs, now I know I wrote about this in an earlier post and was excited about the potential but the "Post it" campaign ran into major snags, the first was the fact that it was illegal to put them on cars in my area! check with your local police for your area. Then you have to deal with the actual placement make sure you hit the local neighborhoods fast and concentrate on apartments and condos with these post its, I found that that market gave the best response to the campaign.

I have been known to run out to the car are get someone a menu! I carry them all the time, because I talk about my pizza "almost" all the time, you and your product are your most valuable marketing tool you have use them.

If you have any questions that you would like help with just drop me an email at chef@fregenes.com and I will get back to you right away.

my new years resolution is to rock out new blogs twice a week, so keep in touch and if you do not have a subscription to Pizza Today magazine GET ONE there are so many great articles and idea's shared buy the top professionals in the field read them they will help you achieve the success that you want.

Thanks

Chef Glenn